It certainly isn’t the first thing you’d think about when it comes to a Thanksgiving feast. I can say however during my visits to Africa a Tongue caserole can be a splendid meal. That however has nothing at all to do with the subject here today.
I attended Montana State University during the 1980’s where I focused on Marketing and Broadcast. While living in Bozeman my father and I spent countless hours pursuing fish and game across the magnificent landscape. In more recent years I’ve hunted elk with Mark Shutey of Stockton Outfitters in Butte, wrestled huge Rainbow Trout from the Missouri and The Madison. I’ve watched plenty of television featuring the amazing hunting across Montana. Frankly I thought I knew the state pretty well. But when I was invited to hunt ‘Big Whitetails and Mulies’ on the Tongue river I scratched my head. In fact I had to pull out my Montana maps and figure out what was really on the table.
The Tongue flows in eastern Montana south of Miles City in an area I was pretty familiar with. I killed two big eastern Montana Whitetails in recent years along the Yellowstone River just outside of Forsyth. One of those deer sported 13 points and measured 167 inches. The truth is however he was no where near the best deer I saw in those years.
After setting down the map and picking up the phone my decision was already made. I had never heard of the Tongue River but it was in the heart of excellent big deer country. The call had come from Steve Sharf and I knew very little about him or the river where he owns 200 acres. I did know that in Montana that would be pretty small if trying to track down a good deer. However as I began to know Steve over the phone he assured me the land was a tangle of black brush and bedding surrounded by large tracts of crop land. It sounded like the right place to set up a stand or two.
A couple of days before flying to Billings I also learned that Steve is a double amputee. he lost his right arm and most of his right leg while working for the power company in 1989. You would never know it aside from the obvious empty sleeve of his shirt or his sometimes sluggish locomotion. He was smiling when we met him at the airport and Ive never met a man with a better attitude in my life.
The 200 acres were exactly as advertised. The cover was thick and covered both sides of the river on a small side road. It looked perfect to me. Glassing from his truck the first night I set my eyes on at least three big bucks and knew i’d made the right call. We took tome to set a blind about 250 yards from the river in an open stretch of timber and headed back to the hotel in Miles City.
The next morning the mercury had settled at 12 degrees below zero. I don’t care where you’re from that is cold!
After about 2 hours my photographer jacob Keel and I decided we’d better make a run to Cabela’s in Billings. Steve agreed and we made the 90 minute trip. I knew I needed a propane heater buddy and some Arctic Shield boot blankets. It ranks as one of my smartest decisions of the year.
We spent the next three days working the river bottom. I passed on a three beamed whitetail… another 130 class buck… a marvelous old mulie buck… and continued to see a legitimate booner about a mile down the road going to and from Steve’s property.
We enjoyed a great Thanksgiving dinner wtih our new friend Steve but I have to be honest heading into our fourth day Jake and i were becoming a little concerned about time. Steve would just smile and say a big one would make a mistake soon.
Well his big smile should have been enough to convince me. On the fourth evening a tall tined 10 point made his way along the river bank. At about 180 yards he was well within reach of my Benelli R1 rifle in 30.06.
After pulling the trigger and watching the deer disappear behind a tree line I was pretty sure we were in good shape but i had a decision to make. you see the deer was on the other side of the river and despite sub zero temperatures my experience made me wary of crossing river ice. I decided to back track and use the high water mark to make my way back to the buck.
By then it was dark and the temperatures were falling fast. The good news was the Benelli piled the buck up in less than 100 yards and cleaning him up took just minutes. I really do the love the Outdoor Edge Knives with the ‘Zip’ gut hook design. There just isn’t anything like it.
At the end of the day Jake and I had seen 15 quality shooter whitetails and three good mulie bucks as well. I’d learned that a man can be mutilated in body while his spirit can still soar. My hat is off to land owner Steve Sharf and my outfitter Vaughn Esper for putting together an amazing Tongue River hunt.
I may not have heard of it before but I’ll tell anyone going forward the Tongue may lick any other deer hunting in Montana. (Iknow but I just could not help it)
